1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a technology to communicate several information in an elevator according to serial transmission methods. Particularly, an elevator control system which transmits the several information for the elevator driving state serially, comprises an elevator controller for controlling an elevator car driving state, a floor controller for controlling inpu/output signals generated from a plurality of floors, and the floor controllers installed in each floor in a building, and a plurality of car controllers for controlling input/output signals generated from in the car. Accordingly, using these devices, the communication efficiency and improvements of the communication reliability among the elevator controller, the floor controllers, and the car controllers can be maximized.
2. Description of the Background Art
In general, the conventional elevator system provided with a number of communication lines which are extended from an elevator machine room to each floor for transmitting a lighting signal of a responding lamp to a hall call signal generated at each floor in a building, and for transmitting the car position indicating signal to the indicator installed in the car.
However, as buildings become higher, and users of an elevator system require more sophisticated services about an elevator control and an indicating method, it was difficult to troubleshoot and repair parts(especially, interfaces between controllers).
To eliminate these disadvantages described above, there is a continued study for reducing numbers of lines installed and for introducing the compatibility of interfaces between the various controllers.
As one of the results of the above-mentioned studies, it is proposed that an elevator controller and a plurality of car controllers be linked together by a common cable, and the signals of respective controller are transmitted using serial transmission method by a microprocessor. However, such a system has a limited communication efficiency capable of handling an elevator system which has sophisticated functions and installed in skyscrapers.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a conventional elevator signal transmission device. In FIG. 1, there are an elevator controller 1 for controlling overall elevator traveling operation upon receiving signals from floor controllers 3A-3C, a hall signal transmitting repeater 2 for sending signals transmitted from the floor controllers 3A-3C to said elevator controller, and for sending the received signals which the elevator controller 1 transmits to the floor controllers 3A-3C installed in each floor in a building via a common transmission line 6, the floor controllers 3A-3C for outputting a traveling information and a responding lamp signal to car position indicators 4A-4C and to hall call button devices 5A-5C received from the hall signal transmitting repeater 2, and for transmitting a call signal input via the call button devices 5A-5C to the hall signal transmitting repeater 2, the car position indicators 4A-4C for displaying a current traveling position of the elevator by receiving a traveling information from the floor controllers 3A-3C, and the floor call button devices 5A-5C for transmitting the call signals to the floor controllers in accordance with the waiting user request, and for displaying that the call signal is registered according to the control of the floor controllers.
FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing another example of a conventional signal transmission device in an elevator system. An elevator controller 1, a hall signal transmitting repeater 2, floor controllers 3A-3C, car position indicators 4A-4C, and hall call button devices 5A-5C are the same as in FIG. 1. In FIG. 2 the elevator system further comprises a car controller 7 for transmitting an output signal of car devices to the hall signal transmitting repeater 2 via the common transmission line 6, and for receiving the traveling information in the elevator from the hall signal transmitting repeater 2, a car indicator 8 for displaying the current traveling position and direction of the elevator by receiving the traveling information from the car controller in the elevator, and a car operating panel 9 for transmitting the generated call signal according to the user request in the car to the car controllers, and for lighting a corresponding floor button by receiving the driving state signal of the responding lamp accordingly. The operation of the signal transmission devices constructed as above will be described with reference to FIG. 3.
The signal transmission among the respective controllers in FIGS. 1, 2 is accomplished by the transmission data format illustrated in FIG. 3. The elevator controller 1, first of all, assigns the floor controller 3C of a first floor, and transmits floor output signals, such as a call responding signal, voice information signal, according to the responding signal received. Thereafter, the elevator controller 1 receives a floor input signal, such as the call button input signal, parking floor designating signal, floor controller check code, and so on from the floor controller 3C.
The elevator controller 1 also assigns the floor controller 3B on a second floor according to the operation described above, transmits the floor output signal, and then receives the floor input signal from the floor controller 3B again. In such ways described above, the elevator controller 1 is capable of successively communicating with the floor controller 3A on the top floor.
Referring back to FIG. 2, in the event that the car controller 7 is linked to the hall signal transmitting repeater 2 via a common transmission line, the elevator controller 1 transmits the output signal to car controller 7 by assigning the respective car controller 7. Thereafter, the elevator controller 1 receives the input signal from the car controller 7 so that the communication among these controllers are accomplished for data exchange.
Upon the completion of sending/receiving operation either between the elevator controller 1 and the car controller 7 or between the elevator controller 1 and the floor controllers 3A-3C for data exchange, respectively, the elevator controller 1 simultaneously transmits a common information of both the car controller 7 and the floor controllers 3A-3C.
The common information might comprise an indicator display information for displaying a current floor position of the car, a direction display lamp information for indicating the up/down traveling direction, a full-car lamp displaying information for indicating that the car passes without stopping since the car is full, a pause lamp information for indicating that the elevator car does not run in a predetermined period of time, and so on.
Upon the completion of the communication from the elevator controller 1 to either the plurality of floor controllers 3A-3C or the car controller 7 for exchange of the individual information and a common information, in other words, from the hall signal transmitting repeater 2 to both the plurality of floor controllers 3A-3C and the car controller 7 in the manner as described above, the various indicator units installed at the floor controllers 3A-3C and the car controller 7, received the corresponding signal to display extra information, such as a weather forecast, a stock market information, an advertising information and so on, in the case of having visual or audible display information units.
In summary, FIG. 3 illustrates the process comprising a first period of time set at will according to the building floor number at which the hall signal transmitting repeater 2 transmits the individual information after assigning successively the respective remote controllers, in other words, the floor controllers 3A-3C and the car controller 7, a second period of transmitting the common information to the remote controllers, and a third period of transmitting various information in accordance with a visual and an audible information process devices. This process is finished as one period, accomplished by repeating above 3 transmission periods.
Since the sending/receiving operation of the individual information for the corresponding floor is performed by assigning the respective devices of each floor during the first period of time, a problem of which the transmission period becomes longer might be partially solved, a constant answering time is guaranteed for taking it granted that the transmission device is slow, and the extra information except the elevator control information can be also transmitted.
After the elevator controller assigns the respective floor controllers, it can detect the failure of the corresponding floor controllers when exchanging the individual information during the first period of time, and after the predetermined period of time has passed, it can service normally in the elevator controller when the failure of the corresponding floor controllers is repaired as in Korean Patent No. 96-12682.
It is natural that the information via the transmission line increases in case that a building becomes higher, devices installed in the elevator system are more various, and the devices which process various kinds of information use the one transmission line. In this case, although the transmission speed should be quick to transmit a lot of information during a predetermined period of time, it is desirable that the transmission speed is slow properly to improve the reliability of communication.
However, in the event that the signal is transmitted by using the conventional communication method as described above even though the building becomes higher, and the elevator runs express, a sending/receiving time of the first period of time is longer in proportion to the number of building floors, the sending/receiving period of time is always assigned to the devices in the elevator system, and actually do not generate the input signals in the process of sending/receiving the individual information on the respective system by designating successively devices of the respective system as well. Accordingly, there are shortcomings that a transmitting time is delayed when the signals are generated in each floor or an indicating time for displaying the driving state of the elevator is delayed because a designation time of the second period of time and the third period of time is assigned late, and it takes much time relatively when the plurality of floor controllers check the failure at every predetermined period of time. These shortcomings are more serious in case of an express elevator.